Chapter Five
In this chapter, let’s talk about theatre’s future, shall we? This is an exercise in the absurd, since I have no idea at all what theatre will look like in the future, and it’s folly to believe anything I say will actually occur. It’s really just an intellectual exercise and has the stench of an after-dinner party parlor game for academics. Notwithstanding, I’m going to do it anyway, because for me it’s a time-killer, something to pass the dreary winter days. It’s also therapy, because I do think about these matters from time to time, and I’d like my ideas to live somewhere else than in my head. It relieves some intellectual tension going on up there.
I’m also going to delve a little more into some of my concerns about Scott Walters’ concepts in his new book Building A Sustainable Theatre. This is the book that prompted me to begin this series in the first place. I was intending to write a series like this anyway, but reading Scott’s book gave this series more of a focal point once we re-ignited our past association.
Let me say this about Scott and his book at the outset. There is nothing about the book with which I fundamentally disagree. And I am absolutely 100% in favor of artists having as much control over their own careers and trajectories as possible. I have nothing but praise for all of Scott’s efforts over the years to reform theatre at the educational level and the professional level, and I’m thrilled to see him getting his ideas out in print. I’m not really writing to prove Scott “wrong.” I am writing to try to give anyone who reads his book a deeper look at the obstacles which confront anyone who attempts to put these theoretical ideas into practice. Scott has written something theoretical (he admits at the outset that he himself has never tried to establish a theatre using his own concepts), and my effort is to take the theory and see how it might or might not be sustainable under current, practical conditions. Unlike Scott, I have been through the process of starting a theatre from scratch, so I speak from practical experience. Also, against my advice, recently my son decided to start his own acting studio (not even a theatre!), and I have been assisting him in that effort. I may talk about those experiences in another chapter, but for now, I’m keeping it on the theoretical level. I just want to make it clear that my concerns and ideas are informed in some measure by personal experience.
In all the previous chapters I have tried slowly to lay the groundwork to demonstrate that theatre at the present moment is in a state of struggle to survive. It’s unfortunate that we use the phrase “theatre is dying,” because theatre, I don’t think, will ever disappear from the human experience. As long as there is someone telling a story to others who are listening to the story, we have theatre. It’s the current model of theatre that is dying, and at some point another model will take its place. What will that form look like, given how the present struggle is playing out?
Scott offers a model which I believe has merit, but as I argued in Chapter Three, has the same odds of success given current conditions as following the traditional path of trying to succeed within the existing model. He lists some reasons why he believes his model is a better choice, so let’s just deal with those now. Scott’s model presumes two things: that the objective is to gain more artistic control over your career, and that there is a group or collective of people who have all contributed some amount of money to form the basis of your theatre; you’re not working solo.
you might actually do some plays instead of just auditioning, thus increasing your experience and building your resume. So this begs the question of which plays. Are you doing the play just YOU want to do, and that make YOU look good? Are you doing the plays the data says you should do but may not appeal to you? Are you doing the plays someone else in the collective wants to do that you might not want to do? Are you doing plays that cost money, or that the collective members are writing? Are they plays that will reflect favorably on your resume if others look at it (and why would you care about building a resume if you’re working in your own theatre?)? In each one of these and several other scenarios, you’re losing some sort of control. I concede that it is better to do plays than just constantly audition, but I think that actors working within the current system who are not doing plays are really just lazy. If you’re not doing plays, you’re really not pursuing a career. There are lots and lots of plays out there to do. If you’re in NYC, there are 748 venues in operation, according to the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment. If you can’t find a play to be in, you’re not trying hard enough.
you are in charge, so your success rests on your own decisions rather than the decisions of others. Presuming you’re working with a collection of other artists, this statement is clearly untrue. You are NOT in charge, and your success rests as much on the collective decisions of the group as your own. If you ARE in charge, then you’re an Artistic Director in the old model, which I thought this model was attempting to eliminate (maybe not?)
you can live anywhere you want, and you don’t have to travel. “Anywhere” is painting with too broad a brush. Remember, the data has to indicate that there is a market for what you’re trying to sell. If there’s no market where you want to live, you either have to change what you’re trying to sell, live where you want but don't build a theatre there, or live somewhere where there’s a market, but may not be where you want to live. And how can you be sure the other members of your group want to live there too? Or will you simply pull all the members from where you decide to park your ass and build a theatre? And will the economic climate be one where you can eat, cloth and shelter yourself at a reasonable cost? I’d love to live in Aspen, CO, but I doubt my budget would take me that far.
you can choose when you work. If you’re working in the theatre and trying to create one that will be sustainable, this is just nonsense. You will ALWAYS be working, either preparing a performance or promoting your goods. And I am going to assume that, when you first start out, you will have a job and all that comes with that, including not being in charge of your personal work/time schedule, until your theatre can pay you and the other members of the company a sustainable living wage. It seems idyllic to say this, but it’s not a life reality. You’ll probably have to work when you have free time from other obligations.
you can choose what plays you do and who you do them with. See the first bullet point above.
In short, and not to be too cruel about it, all these points have a sort of Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney “Let’s put on a show” vibe to them. They’re too simplistic, and they do not address adequately enough the real and serious economic and lifestyle requirements such concepts present. In theory, they look wonderful. In practice, set against the economic realities of food, clothing, and shelter, they present challenges as massive as landing a chorus slot in a Broadway play. The Lion in Winter quote “When all that’s left is the fall, it matters which direction you fall” might apply here; one can always choose which way to fall, statistically speaking. Success stories of people who built sustainable theatres, such as Paula Tomei at South Coast Repertory Theatre or the late Zelda Fichandler at Area Stage in Washington DC, are the exception, not the rule, and were as much a product of their historical time as anything else.
Let me get off Scott’s book now, and offer some of my personal thoughts on the subject of theatre’s future. You will not find a lot of hope in these thoughts, as I think the downward spiral of theatre will continue for some time. Should you choose to bootstrap your own theatre as an entrepreneur, this is the landscape you will find going forward in my opinion.
Theatre will continue to shrink and become more and more of a niche activity as its costs increase. There is nothing in the data that I can find that indicates growth in any sector of the population as surveyed in the SPPA data. Economically speaking, the cost of theatre will continue to stay out of reach for most people. Broadway, if it hasn’t already, will turn into an entertainment district for tourists and cease to be a vital creative center for American theatre. Large regional institutions will either be propped up by donors with very deep pockets, or continue to shrink, crumble and falter as they seek to maintain the status quo. Smaller established theatres will close their doors, and start-ups will largely fail because they won’t be able to attract a sustainable audience.
Theatre will continue to cater to a predominantly white, liberal, older, educated, upper-income clientele. Theatre long ago has ceased to be “for everyone,” and there has been little to no attempt by theatre practitioners to reach out to the conservative wing of society and discover what would entice them to come to the theatre.
Theatre’s struggles with IDEA will lead it to produce plays on subject matter that will have little appeal to a wide audience, but rather to small pockets within its own small niche. Society, as a whole, has made it clear that it views theatre as a home for left-wing political ideology. Since Waiting for Lefty first appeared on Broadway, this has largely been the case. Theatre has championed workers’ rights, civil rights, gay rights, and women’s rights. But in a political climate where MAGA conservatives now attempt to shut down high school productions that have the least little smell of left-wing ideology, theatre’s left-leaning propensities are more evident and open it up to continued attacks by an ascending right wing. Even within the leftist political environment of theatre itself there are divisions along cultural and ethnic fault lines as to who and what should be represented on American stages. Don’t look for this to resolve itself anytime soon.
Theatre will struggle and, in large measure, fail to compete in the digital entertainment market. There was a point in time where I believed theatre would be able to use modern technology to create more immersive forms of theatre that would actually be cheaper to produce.I was very wrong about that. Apart from artists like Robert LePage, technology has failed to produce a new theatrical form, but rather has been used to increase the “wow” factor in terms of spectacle. And far from making production expenses cheaper, the cost of this type of equipment has only become more expensive.
Theatre will spend a considerable amount of time in hibernation (or in a coma) before it will again become a culturally significant art form. There have been several periods in the history of Western theatre where theatre has not produced great or even good art. The period of time from, let’s say, the end of Restoration comedy in England to the arrival of Ibsen, Chekov and Stanislavski was pretty bleak. I think we’re in such a period now, and have been for more than a little while. The last three years have only exacerbated the situation and made it more evident. As I’ve said previously, I do not think the ground is culturally fertile enough at this juncture in history for theatre to become significantly relevant.
I’m going to stop here for now, but I feel there is one more chapter to write. I was taught in high school that, if you want to dissect an argument and successfully point out its weaknesses, you must attack the assumptions and premises on which the rest of the argument is built. In Chapter Six I am going to look at some assumptions that theatre practitioners hold and see if we need to take a more critical approach to those assumptions. Scott is fond of quoting Buckminster Fuller’s quote "You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete." But it doesn’t matter if you’re building a house with a traditional architectural structure or with Fuller’s geodesic domes if both houses are being built on sand; they will both lack a strong foundation to keep them standing. I think we truly need to challenge our assumptions about theatre more than we need new models for theatre.